"Aalto was a master with his
architectural pallet when constructing his existentially
comforting, physiologically soothing, and mentally sound
buildings, which were organically "whole", from the master plans
to the smallest details. A house can also smell, sound and
feel good. And when doing so, it can help man to understand his
place in the world better."

The
following is an excerpt from the proceedings - we provide it
here to illustrate the role of the architect and healthy
buildings.

Aalto
(the architect) at the beginning of his career was very keen on improving the
whole society by improving the quality of everyday life with the means of
solving housing problems. Aalto was strongly linked to the European modernistic
architectural movement. Modern building technology with new construction methods
and materials was emphasized by him and his colleagues. But for Aalto, the
strong underlying theme was rich and human, physically and psychologically
harmonious architecture. He was not a dogmatic functionalist but always stressed
tradition's importance for the human mind. Aalto was a master with his
architectural pallet when constructing his existentially comforting,
physiologically soothing, and mentally sound buildings, which were organically
"whole", from the master plans to the smallest details. A house can also smell,
sound and feel good. And when doing so, it can help man to understand his place
in the world better.

If one derives body and
mind when talking about the term "healthy building", one can try to examine how
Aalto's work functioned, and is functioning, on the technical field of building
construction. Seems that in his early career in the 1930's, technical solutions
were tried over the generations of builders and the craftsmanship was still a
virtue of its own. When the new modern technology met with different new experts
and new, not thoroughly tried materials, a balance with the architecture and the
materials was violated. Although the latest knowledge of the time was used when
constructing, the effort to master nature's physical laws by theoretically
developed solutions was many a time unsuccessful. Aalto's interest turned
monumental and sculptural from the ordinary, the individual artist came through
in his personality.

World is troubled and a
construction work is a universe of its own. Different opposite powers are
struggling with each other. And when the construction ends, the maintenance
should begin. Buildings can be made to grow unhealthy. In Aalto's case, there
are tens of examples of how the poor understanding of the buildings life span
and the lack of respect can cause serious damage first to the house and soon
after to the inhabitants. The lack of understanding, or many times interest,
when making reparations has caused many Aalto's buildings to grow sick. This
does not mean that a building could not go through needy reparations and
possible alterations but this should be done with the appropriate knowledge.
Ironically, many times problems are solved by removing new solutions, and
constructing with aged and tried materials and ways.

As usual, there are no
simple answers or ways to conclude Aalto's long career as a healthy building
architect. One might say, that a good architect is a healthy building architect.
And Aalto was a good architect.